One Truth
by Mintaka14
Summary: Darien has been unmasked and stolen by the Negaverse. The Starlight Tower is crumbling around them. And Serena suddenly has to come to terms with the revelation that she's the Princess Serenity. And Sailor Moon. And Serena Tsukino. It's a lot to take in.


**One Truth**

**A Sailor Moon fanfiction**

**By Mintaka14**

I could shed another million tears, a million breaths,

A million names but only one truth to face ...

... I still love you

[Sting]

Darien was Tuxedo Mask.

Beyond the wide glass windows of the Starlight Tower, the night was a darkness bright with points of light, and high above the city, Serena gripped her glittering wand tightly and watched as Darien stepped out of the shadows, his midnight eyes dark behind the white mask. He moved forward, his black cape unfurling around him, as he faced the witch Zoicite. The woman's dangerous smile grew wider.

Darien was Tuxedo Mask.

Serena felt as if the world had been kicked out from under her, and she wondered why she had never seen it before. How could she have missed something so obvious?

As Darien and Zoicite stared each other down, Serena's sense of disorientation grew. She drew a slow breath, trying to force back the flush of humiliation that was rising in her cheeks. She should have known, when Zoicite had trapped them both in the Starlight Tower, that something was going on. Zoicite had been too interested in Darien, and Darien had known too much.

Serena was supposed to be the great Sailor Moon, champion of love and justice, but she felt superfluous as Tuxedo Mask and Zoicite focused on each other with dangerous intent. Once again, she had only managed to get in the way. When she thought about it, Zoicite had only ever been interested in Sailor Moon as an obstacle to the seven rainbow crystals, or as a bargaining chip to bring Tuxedo Mask into the open.

The darkness outside grew deeper as a cloud slid across the sky blotting out the stars for a moment.

Tuxedo Mask had made it very clear all along that any help he gave Sailor Moon was only a means to the crystals, and now she knew why. She closed her eyes, remembering a world of unexpected hurt behind the cynical facade.

_"There's a girl ... a princess ... that I'm trying to find, and in my dreams those crystals are the key to free her and find out who I am."_ Her hand closed on the phantom memory of his fingers warm on hers for one miraculous moment when she had reached out to him, unable to bear the tight pain in his voice. _"One day I'll find her ..."_

He was in love with the Moon Princess.

The princess was beautiful, graceful, wonderful ... Serena could have hated her for that alone. And everything Serena had done had only damaged his chances of collecting all the crystals and freeing the princess. At the first threat, she had meekly handed over her crystals to Zoicite, and because of her Tuxedo Mask had lost another. And in the Starlight Tower, Zoicite's partner, Malachite, had stolen the remaining crystals from him.

_Oh, Darien must hate me for that,_ Serena thought dismally. She hugged the Moon Wand to her chest as she sniffed back the tears that threatened to spill over. Her only consolation was that Sailor Mars and the other Sailor Scouts weren't there to see her humiliation and misery.

"Get out of here, Serena," Darien said fiercely.

Serena blinked, and found herself staring at his back. He didn't even glance in Serena's direction, all his attention fixed on Zoicite.

"This is my fight. It doesn't concern you."

" 'Course it concerns me," she told him bluntly. "Hello? Sailor Moon here."

He turned on her savagely, and she couldn't help wincing at his tone. "I don't want you getting involved!"

"I know you have to save your princess," she said miserably, fighting not to cry. If all he wanted was his princess ... if that would make him happy ... "It's alright." But why couldn't she have gone on thinking she hated Darien? He was in love with the perfect Moon Princess of his dreams - what chance did she have against that?

"Get out of here," Darien hissed at Serena.

He turned on Zoicite. "You'll have your fight, just let her go."

"Well, come on then," Zoicite purred. "Let's get it over with."

The witch-woman flicked her hand. It felt as though time stopped in the flash of pale light on the wicked shard of quartz, and Serena heard herself scream. The shard streaked through the air, slamming into Darien, and all Serena could see was the bright red blood, and Darien's pale face as he fell. She caught at him, tumbling to the floor with Darien in her arms.

Zoicite was laughing somewhere in the darkness, but Serena couldn't see through the tears that fell.

"Darien," she whispered, so that he could barely hear her. "Stay with me, Darien. Don't you dare leave me now."

Darien's hand lifted briefly, touching her cheek, and then his hand dropped, and Serena could feel the scream tearing at her throat, fighting to break free, as his heartbeat faltered. Her hands were wet with his blood.

"NO!" Everything shook and echoed with the desperate need in her heart, as the cry ripped itself from her.

It rang in her ears and thundered in her veins. The rainbow crystals answered.

As Serena fought to hold Darien's life to his body with nothing but her will, the rainbow crystals resonated with the force of her need. From wherever Malachite had hidden them, they broke free and streaked towards her as Darien's breath faded under her hands. The crystals whirled around her in a storm of colour, coalescing around the Moon Wand in her hand. She held it up, and the rainbows exploded into white brilliance, pouring through her like fire until she glowed like the sun, radiant and terrible with power.

His blood on her hands boiled away like mist as Serena turned her incandescent eyes on Darien. Power and magic ran from her fingertips like honey, and Darien's body seized up as it drew one ragged gasp. He started coughing, a horrible, tearing sound that slowly faded as his breathing settled, but his eyes never opened.

The light faded, and dimmed, and between the dazzling spots that still danced across her vision, Serena could see the four Scouts and Luna and Artemis standing in the shadows of the doorway, watching her with a strange mixture of awe and fear that left her chilled.

One whispered, "Sailor Moon ..."

"Princess ..."

Serena looked down in dull surprise at the wand in her hands, and the fragile crystal embedded in it, still glowing softly with its own light. The Imperium Silver Crystal. She was on her feet, and ivory skirts pooled around her. They brushed against Darien, his breath coming now in a shallow rise and fall as she looked down at him. She lifted one hand, and golden bracelets slid down her arm with a soft tinkling noise.

"I'm the Moon Princess," she said softly with no real interest. Silken skirts drifted around her like a pale cloud, and she was dimly aware of the golden weight of a tiara as she stared down at Darien's pale face that looked so strained, even in unconsciousness. How disappointed would he be, to find out that his precious princess was only Serena?

"Sailor Moon!" someone cried, and Serena turned just in time to see Zoicite moving towards her. Instinctively, she put herself between the witch and Darien.

"Moon Princess, huh?" Zoicite said curiously, her tone lighter than the bitterness in her dark eyes. "Well, isn't that just lovely. And now you have the Silver Crystal, too."

Serena said nothing, and Zoicite's hands clenched.

"I want that Crystal!"

Zoicite attacked.

Burning with leftover power, Serena instinctively flung up the hand still clutching the Moon Wand, and in a voice that didn't sound like her own cried out.

"Cosmic ... Moon ... Power!"

The fire exploded from her in a white-hot rush that flicked Zoicite aside like a bug, and then it was gone. Zoicite fell heavily. Serena's head swam dizzily as she felt the searing magic fade, and the princess' ivory gown with it, leaving Sailor Moon's uniform in its wake. Her legs were weak and trembling as she took a few steps, her eyes fixed warily on Zoicite's still figure. Serena moved a little closer, just waiting for Zoicite to get up, for her to attack again. That distraction was enough. Out of the corner of her eye she caught the flicker of white hair and a grey uniform bending over Darien's unconscious body, and Serena turned, too late.

It felt like those hideous dreams when time stands still and the air is so heavy that it drags at arms and legs until nothing feels real. Serena was moving too slowly. She heard Mars' desperate shriek echoing the scream in her heart, and still she couldn't move fast enough as Malachite lifted Darien effortlessly in his arms and vanished silently.

"NO!" Once again, the cry was ripped from her throat, until there was nothing left but a numb despair. Serena felt herself sliding to the cold floor. "Darien ..."

And in the silent darkness of her anguish she began to remember.

Fragments of a thousand years ago, when she had been the Princess Serenity, flooded through her, and she felt herself drowning in the tidal wave of memories. As if from a great distance, she could hear Luna and Jupiter calling her name, but all she could see were the glittering halls of the Moon Palace. And a pale, dark prince with midnight eyes that looked for her alone.

Serena almost blacked out with the phantom pain that drove through her heart like a knife _...the screams and terrible thunder as the Moon Palace fell..._ with the weight of a thousand memories behind _it ...the dying eyes of the ones she loved..._ and she didn't know if she screamed or not.

"Sailor Moon, we have to get moving."

_...and the monstrous shadow of the Queen of the Negaverse, beautiful and horrible, that loomed in the sky over the broken husk of the Moon Kingdom..._

"... the Tower is coming down. Get her out of here now!"

_...with her golden eyes and her golden hands that snatched up Darien ... no, Prince Endymion ... as if he were nothing more than a child's toy..._

There was a crack like thunder as the floor shuddered, and concrete crumbled and fell like rain. She felt arms close around her, drawing her gently to her feet, but it was all too much, and the helplessness overwhelmed her, dragging her down. She didn't even notice as Sailor Jupiter hoisted her onto her back.

_...the sound of her own frantic heartbeat, and the tears running down her face..._ They were moving, and the world was a bewildering, dark mass of shifting sensations _...reaching through the inferno to a young boy with Darien's eyes...reaching through the veil of dreams, desperately trying to tell her love something that he couldn't or wouldn't hear..._ She struggled to hold onto her own thoughts, whirled away in the storm of dreams and other lives. She had only been four when Darien had nearly died in that car crash, but her mind kept trying to tell her that she had been there with him. Memories overwhelmed her, and they didn't belong in her head.

"She may be a princess, but she's still heavy," Jupiter grumbled softly, and Serena allowed it to distract her from the horrible confusion.

She muttered into Jupiter's shoulder, "I heard that."

Opening her eyes slowly, painfully, she made herself slide to the ground, and flinched as the contact jarred from heels to head. If Jupiter hadn't still had one arm around her she would have fallen. And, oh, it hurt.

Serena blinked, trying to clear the spots from her vision, and winced. They seemed to be somewhere in the basement of the Starlight Tower, but in the darkness it was hard to be sure, and behind her she could hear the rumble and crash as pieces of the tower fell away. Gently, she flexed her fingers against the handle of the wand, trying to restore some feeling that wasn't pure pain. If she had thought that the magic felt warm and prickly when she transformed into Sailor Moon, then the Crystal was like plunging her hands into the heart of a star, and every nerve still screamed with fire.

All around her, her friends were talking, and the noise was like fingernails down a blackboard.

"Is there any way out of here?" Venus was asking, and Mercury frowned down at the tiny computer in her hand.

"I'm working on it ..."

"I can't believe that Serena's the Moon Princess."

Dimly, Serena was aware of Mars clenching and unclenching her hands, glowering into the darkness. "So what next?" the priestess asked. "Are we just going to sit back and let them take Darien like that?"

"Well, what are we supposed to do?" Venus flung back, frustrated. "We have to figure out what to do next."

Luna padded out of the darkness with Artemis on her heels. "Venus is right. If we're going to get Darien back, we need to be prepared."

"Won't the Crystal be enough?" Jupiter asked. "If Sailor Moon just waves it at the Negaverse?"

"It's not that easy," Luna said warily, and Serena felt an odd glance sent in her direction that she chose not to acknowledge.

"But Sailor Moon beat Zoicite just like that ..."

"We always knew, though, that Jedite, Nephrite, Zoicite, and even Malachite were just pawns." Luna's voice was starting to sound strained. "Zoicite was strong and dangerous, but Malachite is far more deadly, and even he isn't the real enemy. Your enemy is the one behind them, the Queen of the Negaverse. Queen Beryl."

_...strange gold eyes..._ Serena shuddered. The girls were looking at each other uneasily, and finally Mercury broke the silence.

"I think I remember something ..."

"I'm getting these weird thoughts," Jupiter said slowly, "like someone else is borrowing my head. There is ... no, was ... a palace ...? A really beautiful place."

"The Moon Palace," Luna said. Serena lifted her eyes briefly. "A very long time ago. What you're remembering was the palace at the heart of the Moon Kingdom more than a thousand years ago, when the Moon governed the Silver Millennium Alliance of planets, and Queen Serenity was the ruler of the Moon Kingdom.

"She was your mother," Luna added gently, catching Serena's eye for a moment.

"Princess Serenity was the heir to the throne, until the Negaverse attacked," Artemis continued. "Just before the Moon Kingdom fell, Queen Serenity decided to salvage what she could. She used the Imperium Silver Crystal to destroy the Negaverse's strongest warriors, and to send the princess, and her daughter's court ..."

"That would be us?" Mars interrupted, and Artemis nodded briefly.

"The Queen sent us all through time and space to somewhere she hoped her daughter would be safe. And you were all reborn here and now, while we waited in case Queen Beryl ever rose again."

"Why didn't we know all this?" Mars asked incredulously. "If you'd told us all this a little sooner, maybe Darien would still be okay."

"We didn't know!" Artemis snapped, his tail lashing.

Luna continued more gently, "Queen Serenity buried our memories along with yours, until the Imperium Silver Crystal opened the floodgate. We're only just starting to remember it all now, and gradually we'll remember more and more of the Silver Millennium and the Moon Kingdom"

_Only just starting?_ Serena felt as if her head was splitting with the deluge of memories flooding her mind all at once. From the mild looks of confusion on everyone else's faces, she had the feeling that things were moving a little more slowly for them, and with the tiny corner left that was capable of feeling anything anymore, she almost hated them for it.

"I know she thought that we'd be happier if we didn't remember," Artemis continued bitterly. "That it was better not to know unless Queen Beryl came back, but I just hope it isn't too late. If we'd known, then we might have been better prepared. As it is ... well, it could be too much for some of us." Serena felt another glance sent her way.

Luna sighed, her whiskers quivering slightly. "And now she has Darien."

"But why Darien?" Jupiter asked. "We know now that he's Tuxedo Mask, but why go after him when they could have taken the princess?"

"Perhaps it was to get to the Moon Princess," Artemis said, pacing a few steps as he thought. "The princess herself has many defences, as we saw, but Darien is a reincarnation too. In the days of the Moon Kingdom, Darien was Endymion, Crown Prince of Earth and beloved of Princess Serenity. If Queen Beryl has him, then maybe she believes she has a bargaining chip, or a hold over the princess."

"Endymion is also a powerful force in his own right," Luna interrupted, her tone oddly sympathetic. "Beryl tried to take him once before, when the Moon Kingdom fell. We have to consider that Queen Beryl may want to control him for herself."

Serena felt a sickening lurch in her stomach, and heard Mars say "Control?" in an unsteady voice. Mars' white face and stricken eyes were just one more stab of guilt in her already overburdened heart.

There was a brief, tense silence.

Mars broke it first, turning to Serena with a strange expression, half fierce, half desperate, on her face.

"We've got to go after him."

"But we don't even know where Malachite has taken him," it was Mercury who answered, and Serena dropped her gaze to stare at the shattered concrete underfoot. "Until we've had a chance to work out some sort of a plan ..."

"If we don't go after him now, it may be too late! They could be doing anything to him." Mars glanced at Serena again, her eyes growing darker with trouble and tension. "You've got to save Darien," Mars almost pleaded, and Serena felt ill.

"How?" She wrapped her arms around herself. "You're the one who's always saying that I can't do anything right, and now suddenly everyone thinks that I'm some mystical princess with all the answers to everything. Well, I can't do this."

Serena squeezed her eyes shut, blocking out the disbelief on Mars' face. _...Darien wearing the armour of a warrior prince, kneeling before his princess, bloody and torn, with absolute devotion in his grim, dark eyes..._

"Serena, you have to do something. He loves you ..."

"He loves _her_, the Moon Princess. Not me."

Mars was staring at her. "But you are the Moon Princess."

"No I'm not!" Serena almost shrieked, and Mars took an involuntary step backwards. "I'm not the Moon Princess, not Sailor Moon. Not Moon anything! I'm just ordinary Serena, and I don't feel well, and I want to go home."

There was a dead silence.

"I want to go home."

As everyone started shouting at her again, Serena hugged her arms around herself, wishing she could just vanish. She couldn't do this anymore, and all she wanted was to go home and make the hurting stop. It was Mercury whose voice broke unexpectedly through the chaos, bringing order out of the turmoil and fear.

"Leave her be!" the dark-haired Scout shouted, startling everyone. She glared around the circle, hands on her hips in an uncharacteristic gesture so that Serena couldn't see the other girls past Mercury's protective stance. Serena was dully grateful.

"This is a lot to deal with, and this is Serena. Let her alone."

Serena was barely aware of Venus' sympathetic shrug, or Jupiter's grimace.

"We're going to take her home. She needs sleep, and we could all use some rest. None of us are up to facing the Negaverse right now, or figuring out a plan ..."

"Plans have changed, Sailor Scouts."

The girls spun around to face the dark, cold voice that echoed off the broken walls of the Tower. Serena found herself flattened against a slab of concrete, fighting the instinct to curl up in a terrified little heap.

Later, she would be ashamed of the way she stood there, frozen, while the Scouts fought to protect her. In numb horror, she watched them fling themselves at Malachite, in his dark sphere of terrible energy, and they fell, one by one. Venus and Jupiter, Mars, and finally Mercury dropped in broken heaps of bright hair and satin between her and Malachite, and she didn't even know if they were still alive.

Malachite lifted his hand, his eyes curiously indifferent. She was going to die.

Unless she did something now.

As Malachite flicked his fingers, Serena's hand shot up.

"Cosmic ..."

Light and fire ripped downwards through the Silver Crystal, tearing through Serena in a terrible holocaust as she flung it outwards into the darkness, fighting to hold on as it threatened to destroy her as well.

"Moon ..."

The dark bent, and wavered.

"Power!"

And Malachite gave an unearthly howl of anguish as the white fire engulfed him. His shadow flickered, and vanished.

Serena crumpled silently to the ground.

The world faded away from her into blessed nothingness.

She had no idea how long it was until consciousness slowly crept back and she felt someone patting at her cheek with a gentle hand. Serena groaned, and cracked one eye open.

"About time," Venus said softly, and smiled, and Serena drew a shattered breath that caught at her ribs. Venus was alive. So was Mercury, she discovered, leaning back into the gloved arms that held her, and if she tilted her head carefully, wincing a little, Serena found she could see Jupiter out of the corner of her eye, and Mars standing back a little in the darkness, her arms folded in characteristic tension. She stretched out one hand, and brushed her fingers over Luna's fur.

"You had us all worried," the cat said, her acerbic tone softened by the faint, unaccustomed noise that might have been a purr as she rubbed her head against Serena's hand. "Talk about sleepyhead ..."

"It's getting close to dawn," Mercury added.

Serena grunted and tried to lever herself upright. There were going to be bruises, she just knew it.

"I'm fine," she complained, waving away the hands that were trying to help her up, until finally she stood unsteadily on her feet. She took a step, and then another, in the ruins of the Starlight Tower, trying to remember how to walk, and realised that she still had the wand clutched in her hand. A stray gleam of light caught the Crystal, and she stared at it blindly, ignoring the soft, uneven sound of their footsteps behind her.

"Princess?" Venus asked gently. She said nothing, her grip tightening on the wand in her hand. "Serena? Are you alright?"

Serena drew a shuddering breath.

_Do I look alright?_ she thought bitterly. _My friends almost got themselves killed because of me. They stole Darien, and I don't even know if he's alive. I'm having a hard enough time just being Serena, and Sailor Moon, and now I'm supposed to be some princess, and they're all looking at me like ... like_... She closed her eyes. _I can't do this. I cannot do this._

She gripped the wand until the gilt ornaments bit into her hands, her palms stinging under her gloves with the pressure. And she almost dropped it as fire raced along her fingers in answer, flowing over her hands. Serena bit back a strangled sound.

"Serena?" Mars asked uncertainly, but Serena didn't hear her. She had held this power. It had tried to overwhelm her every step of the way, and nearly consumed her, and she still felt the searing blaze just under her skin, but she had held the fire of the stars in her hands, and she was still standing.

She had found the Imperium Silver Crystal. She had wielded its savage magic and sent Malachite running from her. She had fought, and won.

She had _won_.

The white light of the Crystal yielded one last fragment, a memory of a rose offered outside a gallery, and an unexpected smile that could bring the stars down from the sky. She closed her eyes, and was startled at how clearly she remembered every little thing _...the rose ... the kiss ... Darien flicking her nose with one finger as he teased her ... holding her test paper over her head with that look that made her want to hit him ... calling her meatball-head. That smile..._ Those memories belonged to her, Serena, not to someone she was supposed to have been a thousand years ago. She was barely aware of the heat under her skin as she hugged the wand tighter. Darien had smiled for her.

She was Darien's princess.

And the Negaverse had stolen him from her.

"Not again," she breathed, and found something unexpected under the fear and exhaustion, something that was diamond hard and fierce as fire. She wasn't going to wait another thousand years for what she'd seen in Darien's eyes when he smiled at her.

It was time to fight back.

"Serena?"

"Not again," Serena said, softly and dangerously. She turned to face her friends, with blue eyes ablaze. The girls stared back at her in open-mouthed shock.

"I'm going to get him back."

The Negaverse was going to regret the day it had messed with Serena Tsukino.

The real fight was only just beginning.


End file.
